Hawk Talk

[JeremyC]

The drive in type zerks are easiest. No tapping the hole, just make sure you get the 3/16 ones.. If the hole ever gets wallered out, you can later drill and tap the hole for a 1/4-28 zerk.

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Originally Posted by Megadan

Cup and cone ball bearing setups are super reliable IF they are maintained properly. My golgwing has the original uncaged ball bearings from 1975, and as long as they are cleaned and greased regularly, they will last over 100k miles no problem.

As I said, I've never had to replace cup-and-cone bearings. The first serious bike I ever had, an Ariel Red Hunter 350, had grease fittings for the top and bottom bearing. They weren't Zerks, they were some English variant. Luckily, the bike came with a little bitty grease gun that fit those grease nipples. So did the hubs, and rear suspension. You had to be careful to avoid over greasing the wheel hubs, or you would get grease on the brake linings. I used long fibre wheel bearing grease in that gun. I don't think you can even find long fibre wheel bearing grease anymore. That grease worked superbly on ball bearings. Chevrolet cars also had cup-and-cone front wheel bearings back then....ARH

[Megadan]

They are a pain to work with sometimes. The old uncaged designs like my bike mean being very careful not to drop or lose one of the 46 ball bearings when pulling the steering head off for servicing.

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Well, for those who wonder where the Chinese cut quality to sell inexpensive motor cycles, one look at the head bearings will tell the tale. Those are not real cup-and-cone bearings. They are a cheap alternative. The man in Honduras who had to replace his steering head bearings after one year (!), luckily for us, took pictures of his old bearings. If I took my steering head apart and found those bearings, I would also switch to tapered roller bearings. They will be easier to service than real cup and cone bearings, and are as good as real cup and cone bearings. More fussy about greasing, but easier to do. If I was building motor cycles, I would never let one out the door with those nasty, cheap, headstock bearings...ARH

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Originally Posted by Megadan

They are a pain to work with sometimes. The old uncaged designs like my bike mean being very careful not to drop or lose one of the 46 ball bearings when pulling the steering head off for servicing.

Yes, that's the way I remember them too. 23 balls top and 23 balls bottom. No grease fittings for them on that bike? For those of you that don't know, there was room for a very tightly fitted 24th ball in both races. But these are "crowded row" style bearings. The missing ball gave freedom of action of the balls, as well as room for grease. Note that 23 balls spread around the circumference of the bearing could deal with both the thrust as well as the radial loads much better than the 12 balls normal in a caged bearing....ARH

[Megadan]

No, no grease fitting on the K0-K2 goldwings, and after that Honda switched to taper needle bearings. I am converting mine over with an All Balls kit as well, not for any other reason than the fact that the seals for the factory bearings are getting hard to come by, and a bit expensive. $20 for one seal, or $35 for a full kit with it's own seals included.

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Originally Posted by Megadan

No, no grease fitting on the K0-K2 goldwings, and after that Honda switched to taper needle bearings. I am converting mine over with an All Balls kit as well, not for any other reason than the fact that the seals for the factory bearings are getting hard to come by, and a bit expensive. $20 for one seal, or $35 for a full kit with it's own seals included.

Wow! $20 for one seal. That would make me switch to tapered roller bearings too....ARH

[Megadan]

Sorry, meant to say seal kit. Usually about 10 bucks a pop if you need just one. But, again, hard to come by the OE ones. The few aftermarket seals out there are generally not well loved for their quality. Lots of guys run the All Balls kit and love it, so I joined the sheep in that pasture. Baaah. lol

[AshBash2022]

Quick Question
What loud exhaust will be best for the Hawk? I'm looking for a really loud one. Like LOUD!

[Megadan]

Want LOUD!? Who needs a muffler....?

The problem with "loud" as a term is that loud is subjective. Some of the older guys on here find the ebay exhaust to be too loud. Others don't find it too obnoxious.

You can always start with the ebay exhaust, see how you like it, and if you want louder still, get a different muffler and put it on there. The whole system is only 130 bucks anyway.

I am looking at putting a different style muffler on the ebay exhaust, but only because I like the idea of having a "DB Killer" I can easily take off or put on.

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Originally Posted by AshBash2022

Quick Question
What loud exhaust will be best for the Hawk? I'm looking for a really loud one. Like LOUD!

A regular megaphone is the loudest exhaust you can put on there. You would have to extend the head pipe farther back, then attach the "Meggy". Beware, lots of jet swapping necessary with a meg....ARH

[iparks81]

Like ARH mentioned you will have to re-jet, and be prepared to lose a ton of torque...no back pressure on the exhaust = no low end
I bought a shineray from a friend and it had a strait pipe...Yup Good and loud, but no nutz...I installed a slip-on muffler, still good sound, but It had much more low-mid Torque. Theres some hills here on the island that require WFO in 4th to make it up 3rd if your riding with a passenger, and having the strait pipe
vs slip on made the difference on making the hill....had to shift down to second and nearly Wide open to make it up with strait pipe.
Same story with my Harley back in the day, Had a supertrapp and it ran great, then I felt like I wanted to make more noise...I bought a set of V&H staggered straits...lost a ton of power, and eventually went back

[Ariel Red Hunter]

Originally Posted by iparks81

Like ARH mentioned you will have to re-jet, and be prepared to lose a ton of torque...no back pressure on the exhaust = no low end
I bought a shineray from a friend and it had a strait pipe...Yup Good and loud, but no nutz...I installed a slip-on muffler, still good sound, but It had much more low-mid Torque. Theres some hills here on the island that require WFO in 4th to make it up 3rd if your riding with a passenger, and having the strait pipe
vs slip on made the difference on making the hill....had to shift down to second and nearly Wide open to make it up with strait pipe.
Same story with my Harley back in the day, Had a supertrapp and it ran great, then I felt like I wanted to make more noise...I bought a set of V&H staggered straits...lost a ton of power, and eventually went back

Well, you are at least 75% right on this, but there is a way to get some torque back with a megaphone exhaust. That's the little reverse cone at the very back of the meg. A straight meg (no reverse cone) operates from about a thousand rpm below peak torque to just above maximum (horse) power. By using a reverse cone megaphone, you get a more usable mid range. The straight meggy is a bitch to tune for from down low to about 4500 rpm. There is even a word for this sorry state of affairs. "Megaphoneitis"....ARH

[Ariel Red Hunter]

I go back in history to see if we can learn lessons from our predecessors. All singles are related. Almost all of them have roller bearing big ends, and either roller bearing or ball bearing main bearings. Some had plain bearings on the timing side, but that was because it was an easy way to get oil into the crankshaft to feed the big end None of them had pressure-fed main bearings, except as noted above. These engines ranged from gutless go-to-work bikes, to engines designed with sporting ambitions. Many improvements in metallurgy, and foundry technique have been applied to these engines. Every valve layout has been tried and had at least some success. T heads were the least successful. But side valves(flatheads) were used until the middle fifties. Overhead valves started early, but the lack of sophisticated metals for valves held them back for many years. The Hawk engine is a relatively mildly tuned engine, but with the basic design of a real long life workhorse, capable of being tuned to get more power. I also cite bikes from the past to demonstrate that tuning for speed has been going on for 100 years, and what we know is what has been found to work. And work on any single that has a stout enough bottom end - like the Hawk has....ARH

[pete]

Originally Posted by AshBash2022

Quick Question
What loud exhaust will be best for the Hawk? I'm looking for a really loud one. Like LOUD!

Are you into pissing people off ?




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